


Walkin' After Midnight

by Profoundly_Poetic (LinguistLove_24)



Category: Country Music RPF, Nashville (TV), Real Person Fiction
Genre: Abuse Mentions, Alternate Reality, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Celebrity, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Crossover, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, F/M, Flashbacks, Future Fic, Gen, Inspired by Real Events, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Multi, POV First Person, RPF, Sister-Sister Relationship, Song Inspired, Song Lyrics, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-07
Updated: 2019-02-19
Packaged: 2019-10-24 02:00:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17695475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LinguistLove_24/pseuds/Profoundly_Poetic
Summary: The Legend Herself was spared March 5th of '63 and lives to encounter one of Rayna's children at The Bluebird.AU set 2025.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've always loved Patsy Cline, and since she's such a huge part of country music history had to incorporate her/aspects of her life into a piece of Nashville based fiction. 
> 
> My little What If take on how that would have gone had she been afforded a longer career.
> 
> Snippets of lyrics are from Meghan Patrick's I Won't Drink and Patsy Cline's Walkin' After Midnight, respectively. Obviously credit for those goes to the songwriters. Everything else is mine and purely fiction.
> 
> This has been proofed, but any errors are my own slip.

**Walkin' After Midnight**

 

“Mama, are you okay?”

 

 

It's only just passed 9:00 in the evening on a Friday, and I've lost count how many times my adult daughter has asked me this question in the last half hour. I can see a little more reason for it now – The Bluebird is buzzing, as it usually is when the doors open – and hordes of people I'd forgotten I ever knew have inched closer to where we're sitting in attempt to say hello.

 

Nostalgia washes over me and I feel my limbs tingling in tandem as faces I don't recognise show signs of pre show jitters all over them. These faces, for the most part, are young. The spirits housed within their bodies are no doubt full of hope, determination and promise, yet laced with an ever present - and sometimes inexplicable - sense of foreboding and angst.

  
  
Each story is different, but most musicians have some of that in them for one reason or another.

 

 

A small smile tugs at the corners of my mouth. I remember fondly – and at times not so fondly - being right where these young'uns are.

 

 

I remember where I started. In the depths of myself, I'll always and forever be one of them.

 

 

“Julie, how many times are you gonna ask me that question?”

 

 

Shuffling in my seat, I slide oversized shades to the top of my head to look my child in the face. The crowds of well wishers have slowly tapered off, anxious to find their own seats, and I'm unabashed in my irritation now that we're alone. She can tell I'm unimpressed, and I see her slouch, body shrinking away from me, just the slightest.

 

 

“Well, I'm just askin'!” she huffs, shrugging her shoulders. “Sorry for caring so much.”

 

The latter part of her statement - the thickness that still seems to hang in the air between us after it – tell me she's jaded, even if only slightly. Reaching for her hand across the small tabletop and covering it with my own, I soften.

 

 

“I'm sorry. I know you only ask because you worry, but honey I'm old, I ain't dead.”

 

 

“I know,” Julie chuckles. “Trust me, I know. This place would be making an awful stink if you were.”

 

 

She winks and plays tongue through teeth mischievously, though I can barely make it out for the space being dimly lit. It's gotten more so each passing minute we've been here.

 

 

I decide in that moment that I'm glad I came, even if I had to be talked into it by my children. Even if the rest of the evening does not turn out to be what I expect, being back here, even for a few minutes, has been good for me. It feels like home.

 

 

I lean in closer to my daughter's ear and start to say something in response to her, until I realise a shadow looms over us.

 

 

“Can I get y'all anything?”

 

 

A waitress with tired eyes (and mass amounts of eyeliner that wasn't doing them any favours) stands before us, empty tray tucked under one arm and a notepad in hand, pen poised and ready.

 

 

She too is young. I feel ancient in comparison to most folks here, but they fawn over me as though I'm some sort of god.

 

 

“ _The legend herself,”_ they say, and I smile that practised, humble smile I'd assumed long forgotten, but I hate it.

 

 

“I'm good, thanks,” Julie's lilt pulls me out of my head and I look into the girl's heavily lined though soft, kind eyes.

 

 

“Beer for me, honey.”

 

 

She half smiles, but something tells me some little piece of her she doesn't show the rest of the world – or maybe a big one – is irreparably broken.

 

 

“Draft or bottle?”

 

“Bottle, please.”

 

Assuring us she'll be back quickly, she turns and saunters away. I catch the thick, dark letters jumping out from her gold name plate just before.

**  
DAPHNE**

 

I'm overcome by a nagging suspicion I should know her, that I do. I shrug it off best I can as the lights fade dimmer still. I can't for the life of me recall where I may have seen her before.

 

 

 

***~***

“Oh, _my god_ , I'm so sorry! Here, let me help you.”  
  
Daphne is frantically picking up wads of napkins in attempt to mop up the mess of booze covering the tabletop and dripping slowly down onto my shoes. I can feel it, but I don't care.  
  
“I got it,” Julie tells her kindly as she helps from one side.  
  
“I'm so stupid,” Daphne berates herself repeatedly under her breath, and I can tell she's trying not to cry.  
  
“I don't know why I took this job,” she says, looking up into my face. “I'll get you another drink. I'm sorry.”  
  
“You damn well should be sorry, spillin' beer on The Cline.”  
  
A voice I recognise – severely slurred thanks to an excess of alcohol – hits my ears and I turn in its general direction, making out the silhouette of a musician I'd run with for years but hadn't always liked, in the semi dark.  
  
“Ah shut up, boy. How much you had to drink tonight?”

 

“Too damn much,” a female voice pipes up, and I cackle. No doubt his flavour of the month.

 

“Come on, Pat, I'm just sayin' is all.” He swigs the last of his beer, sets it down next to the others on the table with more force than necessary. “Kids take these jobs wantin' quick cash and don't realise the royalty in and out of here every day.”  
  
“Oh, how in Holy Hell do you know what they want?!” I'm incensed and can feel my cheeks flush, but trying desperately to keep my temper in check so as not to draw further attention to myself. “You got another thing comin' if you think any of us in this room are royalty, too. The Cline was and is a regular ol' country gal before anything else.”  
  
Daphne sets a newly opened bottle of Miller down in front of me and I smile.  
  
“Thanks, hon.”  
  
“Wait.. The Cline... Pat... _you're_ Patsy Cline?” she gasps, horrified at the realisation.  
  
“Last I checked, yeah.” I chuckle, trying to make light of the situation. I want to let her see that I am not and was not bothered by it, but she has turned and run, making a beeline for the ladies' room.  
  
“Leave it,” Julie tells me, and pats my hand as if the action will somehow stop me rising from my seat.  
  
“She's a little girl,” I insist, though she was obviously at least adult enough to be working around liquor. Everyone fifty and under seems young to me now. “I'll be back.”  
  
“Mama...” Julie says in exasperation.  
  
“I'll be right back,” I repeat. “I promise.”

 

**~*~  
  
**

 

“Daphne?” My voice echoes and bounces off the walls, intermingling with heavy sobs as soon as I walk in the restroom.  
  
I stand by the bay of sinks as though I have all the time in the world, not wanting to be intrusive.  
  
“Daphne it's Patsy. I know you're in here. Come out and talk to me. Pretty please?”

 

“No,” she sniffles. I'm fine, don't worry about me.”

 

“Most of us don't hide in the women's room to cry when we're fine, sugar. I got all night. You can stay in that cramped and shitty little toilet stall or you can unlock the door and come tell ol' Patsy what's wrong.”  
  
The sound of a laugh bounces off the enclosure, almost as though it escaped the young girl's body in spite of herself.

 

Feet shuffle. I can see her black lace up boots through the space at the bottom of the door. Unlatching it, she slowly and timidly steps out to face me.  
  
“It wasn't just about the beer,” she tells me sheepishly.  
  
“Well, I kinda figured that, babe. Please don't worry about it, though. Truly.”

 

“I'll try not to,” she half smiles. “Are your shoes okay?”

 

I look down at my feet before carefully moving to sit on the section of vanity close to the sink. Daphne looks slightly surprised at how agile I still am. “Hated 'em anyway,” I wink, and she cackles.

 

“So what's wrong?” I ask softly once she's composed herself.

 

A long puff of breath escapes as she exhales.  
  
“I don't know. I'm just a mess. My life has spiralled out of control ever since my Mom died.  
  
“It's been years now and I should be over it, but I'm not. Deacon had cancer and we got through that and then we lost Mom and everything went to shit.

 

"I push people away and fuck everything up and I hate myself for it.”  
  
I want to ask more questions, do something to comfort her, make her feel better, but all I can do is open and close my mouth stupidly as one fragment of what she has said rattles round and round in my head.  
  
_Deacon._  
  
Deacon Claybourne.

 

Daphne is his step daughter.  
  
“Your mother was Rayna Jaymes?” I breathe, incredulous. “I thought you looked familiar.”  
  
“Yeah,” Daphne says quietly. “Part of what made me run off when I realised who you were. Mom talked about you some when I was smaller.”

 

“Did she? I have some fond memories of your Mama. Opened for me once way back in the day. Before anybody knew who she was.”  
  
“Really?” Daphne intones, surprised. “I saw a picture or two of y'all around the house, but I don't remember her mentioning anything about that. Not in detail, anyway.”  
  
“Yeah,” I muse softly, remembering, knowing exactly why she didn't.

 

**~*~  
1992**

 

_Darkness surrounds me, and it takes a moment for my eyes to adjust. I am disoriented, unaware of anything other than the fact that the wheels of the vehicle nearly perpetually spinning beneath me have stopped. We are parked for the evening. Our next stop is close enough that we don't have to drive all night to be there by daybreak. The angry voices that have pulled me from slumber are ones I do not register quickly. Not until I remember that my openers had retired to their own vehicle parked mere feet away in another section of the same lot, hours prior._

 

 

 _“Baby, I'm soooooorry!”_  
  
_Glass clangs against something and shatters._

 

 _“Fuck you and your sorry ass. It's always the_ same _goddamn thing, Deacon. We'll be lucky not to get kicked off of this tour because of you!”  
  
“Ray..”  
  
“No! Shut _up! _Don't talk to me. You love the bottle more than me and you always have. I don't know why I keep telling myself any different.”_

 

_“I don't!”_

 

 _“You_ do! _You always have, and always will. I'm done. I'm_ so _fucking done.”_

 

_Hinges creak, and a door slams shut. They had been calling for rain overnight, but so far from the confines of the bus I've not heard anything heavy come down. I still can't. Thoughts of Rayna alone and consumed by such darkness – both inside her mind and out – catapult me back to my own twenties, remind me of how much I hated Charlie when he drank too much._

 

_For a moment, I wonder if I'd be overstepping, but the thought leaves my mind as quickly as it had come. In such times of despair everyone needs a friend, even if we've managed to convince ourselves otherwise._

 

 _A smile tugs at the corners of my mouth and I'm flooded again with images of Dottie West._  
  
_She is dead and I am here. For all the times I have tempted fate and seemed to stare death directly in the face, it should be reversed._

_On the world stage, she had two names._

 

_To me she only ever had one._

 

_She was the friend I always said I didn't want to burden, but the one who knew I needed her even before I did._

 

_The passage of a year has not brought with it enough strength to be able to remember her without crying._

 

_I often wonder if it will ever get easier._

 

_I don't think so. But I know that if Rayna is feeling anything close to such agony that takes up home inside my chest at the mere mention of Dottie's name, then she needs someone._

 

 _I rise from the pull out bed I've become so accustomed to I've stopped missing my own and snatch a light jacket from a hanger in the closet._  
  
_I don't know if Rayna smokes, but I'm craving one despite the promise to myself – yet again – that I will quit._

_Half a pack is still sitting on the counter in my kitchenette where I'd left it, and I hastily tie into it, stuffing two cigarettes in my pocket._

 

_“Hey.” I speak loudly enough that Rayna will hear me, but I don't want to startle her. She turns once she hears the thud of the bus door behind me, manages a watery smile._

 

_“Hey yourself,” she quips as I move closer and come to a stop. She wipes her eyes, aims for discretion and nonchalance, but fails. I know how hard she's been crying. I used to be her._

 

_“Cigarette?”_

 

 _“Ah, what the hell?” She takes the thin stick from my outstretched fingers, and our digits briefly brush against each other._  
  
_“Jesus, Ray, your hands are freezing.” Shrugging my jacket from my shoulders, I move to put it over hers._  
  
_“Thanks,” she says, wrapping it tighter around her. “You got a light?”_  
  
_“Shit, yeah, sorry.”_

 

_Touching my lighter to the end of the roll between her lips, she inhales, proceeding to cough up a lung._

 

_“You don't smoke much do you, child?” I laugh good naturedly as she hands it back to me._

 

_“You caught me,” she gasps, trying desperately to compose herself. “You heard Deacon and I, didn't you?”_

 

 _Her head dips and she avoids my gaze, as though she is ashamed._  
  
_“I'm sure I wasn't the only one,” I tell her softly._

 

_We stay like that for a while, statuesque and finding sense of home and comfort in habits that will probably kill us one day. She does not look at me and I do not ask questions. I know that you cannot pry people's pain out of them. Folks have spent the better part of six decades trying to expose mine, and I have only unmasked it before those patient souls who did not ask me to._

 

_“He's such an asshole,” she laments as she stomps the butt of her cigarette into the pavement with the toe of her boot. “Never remembers anything he does while he was all liquored up.”_

 

_“Most drunks don't, babe.”_

 

_“I don't know why I forgive him.” Voice cracking, this is the moment she decides to look at me. All of her vulnerability is pooled in the depths of her eyes, and I try not to wince as I take in the puffiness and bruising around one of them. I can make it out clearly, even in the dark._

 

_“Because you love him.” I sound hollow, detached from myself. “You know who he is when he's sober. When we love we want to see the best in people. Once that best has been exposed, we try to find it all the time, even in the places those loved ones are broken. Even in all the places we hate the most.”_

 

_She stares at me silently, as though she wants to ask me in detail how I've become so knowledgeable on the subject, but thinks better of it._

 

_“He's only done it once. I can tell he regretted it.”_

 

_Her defense of the man she loves pierces the quiet, but doesn't sound defensive. I have no room to judge her, nor to be angry, but a little part of me is irrationally so. Things are different today. Women have more choices and don't have to try quite so hard to be valued._

 

_“I'm not in a position to tell you what to do, Rayna, and I'm not going to. But even once ain't right. Just know it's not something you have to put up with.”_

 

_“You're right when you say I know who he is when he's sober.” Her bottom lip is quivering, and she bites down on it to keep from crying. “When he's not drunk he's the best person in the world. Sometimes we're like gasoline and matches, and I've told myself I've given up on him so many times. I just can't seem to let go. Some might call it dependent, but I do love him.”_

 

_“I know, baby. I know you do.”_

 

_There's nothing else I can say that won't sound trite or insincere, so I merely close the space between our bodies and embrace her, carefully wiping trickles of tears that have fallen in spite of her best efforts to impede them._

 

_We are fused that way – almost as one single unit - for what seems much longer than the few moments it is. I am reminded of my own daughter, who is not that much older than Rayna, and become engulfed by a sudden wave of homesickness. I tell myself I must remember to call her later._

 

_“You hear that?” Rayna is half sobbing, half laughing and attempting to pull away from the shoulder of my shirt._

 

 _“That rumbling?” I ask, raising my eyebrow as I pull away from her. “I thought it was thunder.”  
  
“Oh, pfft. It wasn't _that _bad. It was my stomach.”_

 

_I realise how long it's been since I myself have eaten once she mentions it._

 

_“I'm hungry too. You wanna come on over to the bus? I can fix us somethin' and you can tell me what you and Deacon were fightin' about if you want, maybe write a song about it. I'm sure his drunk ass needs some time to cool off anyway.”_

 

_“Sure.” She smiles, and it's the first genuine one I've seen from her all evening. “I won't be writing anything, though,” she tells me as she starts walking briskly toward my home away from home. “Deacon broke my guitar.”_

 

_“Stupid fuck!” I bark, much louder than I meant to. “I'd've knocked him upside his head. You can borrow one of mine if you want.”_

 

_“Wow, thank you.”_

 

_“You okay with spaghetti?” I question as I ascend the steps ahead of her and open the door. “I ain't got ingredients for much else in here right now.”_

 

 _“My favourite.” Stepping inside, she peels off my coat and moves to hang it in the closet, taking everything in along the way.  
  
“Mine too,” I laugh, setting to work in the tiny kitchen.  
  
“This is _nice _,” she whistles, impressed. “Bigger than ours.”_  
  
_“With your talent, one day you'll have one bigger than mine. The name Rayna Jaymes will be everywhere. Rollin' off everybody's tongue.”_  
  
_“I doubt that,” she tells me, and rolls her eyes dramatically._

  _I meant it, even if I could tell in that moment she didn't believe me._

 

**_~*~  
_ **

“You okay?”

 

I am pulled out of my recollections by the horrid sound of retching echoing off the walls, and Julie's concerned voice in close proximity to me. Coming to, I see her heels through the opening in the bottom of the toilet stall and realise she must be crouched down in a corner, Daphne doing the vomiting.  
  
“No,” she chokes out in between heaves when she can breathe. “Make it stop.”  
  
“Oooh baby I know, I wish I could, but you gotta get it out. Don't fight it.”

 

“What's going on?” I say from the other side of the door, feeling guilty for having spaced out so long.  
  
“We're fine,” Julie assures. “If you wet some paper towels and bring 'em here I'll open the door and fill you in in a minute.”

 

I quickly do as she asks and slide the wad of damp towel through the bottom of the stall door into her outstretched hand. After she is certain Daphne's insides have stopped rolling and has finished wiping the sweat from her forehead, she unlatches the lock and they both step out.

 

“Hey,” Daphne says breathlessly.  
  
“Sorry I spaced out on you there,” I tell her. “We got talkin' about your Mama and my brain went places.”

 

“It's okay,” she waves dismissively. “Julie came in not long after.”

 

“Yeah?” My eyebrow raises involuntarily. “What were y'all talkin' about?”

 

“Stuff,” Julie says, and she and Daphne exchange a look. “You wanna tell her?”

 

“Not really,” Daphne says flatly. Julie nudges her shoulder and she sighs heavily. “I'm pregnant.”

 

The flash in her eyes tells me she's afraid it'll get out, that I will say something. I shake my head just enough for her to see, let her know that I won't.

 

“I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess that this is what you meant when you were talking about how you fuck everything up and push people away?”

 

“Part of it,” Daphne answers, not elaborating further.

 

“Does anybody else know?” I ask, though it's not really my business.  
  
“No, it's still early. I'm not sure I want to have it. I went to a clinic already, but couldn't go through with it that time.”

 

She looks away from me and toward my daughter, who instinctively grabs her small frame, pulling it against her own and whispering into her hair. Standing there listening to the echoes of her sobs, I am plagued by the feeling that I've said something wrong, though logically I know none of this is my fault.

 

My eyes find Julie's and stare into her face questioningly. _Did I do something?_ I mouth.

 

Her head bobs to the negative. “You can tell her, I don't care,” Daphne chokes, still sobbing.

 

“The father is...um....” Julie trails off.  
  
“A fucking piece of shit,” Daphne finishes.  
  
“Right.”

 

“He's on drugs,” she tells me, pulling away from Julie and crouching to sit cross legged on the floor. “That was a dark period. I made some really shitty decisions.”

I don't say anything. Words don't feel appropriate, so I nod.

 

“Nobody ever thinks it can happen to them,” she continues. “I never thought I'd be this girl. I don't even know _what_ I am anymore.

 

“I've given up on everything. Hardly talk to anybody that loves me because I feel like such a fuck up.

 

“What kind of mother would I be?” she asks neither of us in particular. “I'm twenty one and work in a bar. I don't even sing anymore. Every time I open my mouth I think of Mom.”

 

“You're really good,” Julie says encouragingly, squeezing her shoulder. “She'd want you to sing. My Mom would hate if I never sang again just because she was gone.”

 

“You're goddamn right!” I huff, not solely to prove her point.

 

Daphne looks between us and laughs. She has her mother's smile in that second.

 

“Can I hear you sing something?” I ask cautiously. “Please?”

 

“Yeah, come on. The acoustics in here are pretty good,” Julie nods.

 

“Okay,” she agrees timidly. “What song?”

 

“Whatever you want,” I tell her. “I don't know what you know.”

 

“Meghan Patrick?” she says, and Julie's eyes light up.  
  
“I _love_ her!”

 

 

**When I'm drinking  
I start thinking  
Maybe you weren't really all that bad  
One more red wine and the good times  
Start to feel like they were all we had  
The wine leads to the whiskey  
You text me that you miss me  
**

 

 **So I won't drink anymore  
** **So I won't hurt anymore  
** **I miss that buzz sometimes  
** **But it's worth the sacrifice  
** **I'm still fighting that temptation  
The alcohol's an invitation for my heart to let you come back through that door  
So I won't drink anymore**

 

 

**Today I left work  
Told myself it won't hurt  
To stop and have one drink with my friends  
I have that cold glass right there in my hand  
I raised it to my lips and thought again  
'Cause I'm stronger when I'm sober  
It's better that we're over  
So I left that glass of trouble sitting right there on the bar **

 

 **So I won't drink anymore  
** **So I won't hurt anymore  
** **I miss that buzz sometimes  
** **But it's worth the sacrifice  
** **I'm still fighting that temptation  
The alcohol's an invitation for my heart to let you come back through that door  
So I won't drink anymore  
  
**

I glance at Julie and see her eyes are glistening. It doesn't feel like we are in the women's room of The Bluebird, and we shouldn't be. This voice was made for centre stage and does not belong in such mediocre spaces. Daphne has forgotten we are even here, and I am struck by how much Rayna and Deacon are present in the lyrics bled forth from their child's mouth.

 

I have not told her of the parallels between her current life and her mother's past one; of the incident on the road that night in '92, nor of the miscarriage Rayna had spoken of over spaghetti on the bus. I do not want these things tainting the view she has of her parents or influencing her decisions. I don't know Daphne's full story, and it is not my job to know. I do know for certain that anything her mother had wanted to disclose she would have done.  
  
“Was it that bad?” Daphne says dryly, the room having gone deadly silent.

 

“Not even close,” I tell her. “How could you give up singin' with a voice like that?”  
  
“There's not a lot of joy in it anymore. My sister is the one who lives and breathes it now.”

 

“You don't have to be good like her you know,” Julie says. “You could be good like you.”

 

Daphne rises from her spot on the floor and I clasp her hands, nodding in agreement with my daughter's sentiment. “Honey, have you talked to anyone?”  
  
“Like, professionally?”

 

I nod again.  
  
“Not really,” she says. “They tried to force me when I was younger but it was like pulling teeth. Maybe I should've. I just thought it was all bullshit at the time.”

 

“I used to be that way too,” I tell her. “But I went to someone after the plane went down in '63 and then again after Dottie died. Second time was worse. I was meant to be on that plane with Hawkins and the rest of 'em, but Dottie convinced me to drive home with her in the car 'cause of the weather. When she died it brought back a lot of shit, but I've learned that when it's our time there ain't much we can do to stop it.”  
  
“Did it help?” she asks “Talking?”

 

“I don't think you ever totally heal. You move through it rather than get over it,” I say honestly, swallowing the lump forming in my throat. “But I think I'd've been a lot worse off keeping it all inside this long. You should think about it.”

 

“I will,” she nods, and I believe her.  
  
“Boss is probably wonderin' where you are. We're missin' half a show,” Julie informs us, looking down at her watch. “Whadda you say we get back out there, huh?”

 

**~*~**

 

“Well _hush_ my mouth, look what the cat drug back in!” the emcee booms over the microphone before the three of us have made it back to our table from the ladies'. The lights are not quite so dim as they were when I'd departed earlier.

 

“Patsy motherfuckin' Cline!”  
  
Focus is turned on me, everybody claps and hollers, and I want to kill all of them. Even Julie has joined in the fuss. I shoot daggers at her with my eyes once I notice, and she stops.

 

“Alright y'all, that's about enough,” I say. “Really unnecessary.”

 

“You think you can choke down that big 'ol hunk of humble pie stuck in your throat long enough to get up here and sing us a song?”

 

The question eggs the masses on further before they all fall quiet, awaiting my answer.

 

“Oh, alright,” I relent, just to appease them, and walk up to the front of the room.

 

**~*~**

 

“Y'all know I been out of the game for a while now,” I mutter into the mic from my position on a stool while the band plays random chords behind me. “But they say ninety three is the new twenty three and I ain't dead yet. I been blessed with some pretty good health and a pretty good life despite some hard times and some close calls, so decided to come out tonight with a little coaxing from my children.  
  
“I wasn't planning on singin', Was just gonna watch the young'uns. But then I got talkin' to someone about how if you have the talent, you should use it no matter what life throws at you. I'd be a hypocrite not to take my own advice, so now I'm sittin' up here.

 

My eyes find Daphne in the crowd, tucked away behind the bar, her hair now tied in a chignon style knot at the top of her head with a pen slid through it. She is smiling, and I smile back.  
  
“But before I sing y'all somethin', I gotta call someone up here with me. She's tucked away behind that bar over there thinkin' she should give up music, but I need y'all to show her that she's wrong. Daphne, honey, get on up here.”

 

For a moment, she looks like she wants to murder me, and I can hear the pounding of my heartbeat in my eardrums. Just as quickly as it had come, the irritation on her face dissipates and she laughs until she is doubled over.

 

“Child, did you hear me?” I berate her mockingly. “Get on up here.”  
  
I watch delightedly as she moves to the front of the stage, still giggling. “I hate you,” she says good naturedly once she climbs up next to me.  
  
“You'll get over it,” I wink.  
  
“What're we playin' boys?” She inquires behind her, craning her neck. “I don't have my guitar with me tonight.”

 

“Walkin' After Midnight!” someone yells, and I roll my eyes.

“Child, please, ain't you sick of that little ol' pop song by now?”

 

“Well _I_ happen to love that song,” Daphne retorts smugly. “I think we should make her do it just as payback for dragging me up here, what do y'all think?”

 

The thunderous applause speaks for itself.  
  
“Walkin' it is,” I say. “Do your thing, boys.”

 

“Y'all know what key to do it in?” Daphne asks them.  
  
They nod, and fade effortlessly into a number I've heard one too many times:

 

 

**I go out walkin' after midnight  
Out in the moonlight  
Just like we used to do, I'm always walkin'  
After midnight, searchin' for you**

**I walk for miles along the highway  
Well, that's just my way  
Of sayin' I love you, I'm always walkin'  
After midnight, searchin' for you**

**I stop to see a weepin' willow  
Cryin' on his pillow  
Maybe he's cryin' for me  
And as the skies turn gloomy  
Night winds whisper to me  
I'm lonesome as I can be**

**I go out walkin' after midnight  
Out in the moonlight  
Just hopin' you may be somewhere a-walkin'  
After midnight, searchin' for me**

**I stop to see a weepin' willow  
Cryin' on his pillow  
Maybe he's cryin' for me  
And as the skies turn gloomy  
Night winds whisper to me  
I'm lonesome as I can be**

**I go out walkin' after midnight  
Out in the moonlight  
Just hopin' you may be somewhere a-walkin'  
After midnight, searchin' for me**

 

By the end, Daphne is holding up the song all on her own. Like the rest of the audience, I cannot help but be captivated by her. Her mother had that quality. I wonder looking at her if one day when I am long gone she will also be afforded the moniker of legend, perhaps even take my place, but I can tell she is unconcerned with such things.

 

As the notes fade, all she notices is her sister, who has done her best to situate inconspicuously along a back wall.

 

“Go talk to her,” I whisper, bending close to her ear to be heard over the din of applause and pleas for an encore. “Even if you're not sure about this whole talkin' business I think she's a good place to start. Wouldn't be here if she didn't care.”

 

Smiling, she steps down from the stage, but turns back toward me again.  
  
“Hey, Patsy?”

 

“What, child?”

 

“Thanks,” she winks. “You're really cool. I can see why Mom would've liked you so much.”

 

“You're not so bad yourself,” I answer, my insides warming. “You keep singin' now, you hear? Don't give that up or I'll have to come find you.”  
  
“I promise,” she laughs.

~*~

“Daphne,” I hear Maddie say as Julie and I – arm in arm – make to leave just before closing. “Are you okay? You're being really weird.”

 

“No,” Daphne answers, and Maddie looks surprised. “I mean yeah, but no. We have a lot to talk about. You wanna go for a walk or something? Maybe go see Dad?”  
  
“Yeah, sure, we can do that. Whatever you need to tell me, it's okay. We'll figure it out.”

 

I see an in as Maddie moves away to get her coat and Julie takes it.  
  
“If you need anything,” she tells Daphne in muted tones. “Get hold of me, okay? I mean it.”

 

She nods, and I move closer. “Ditto. And for what it's worth,” I add, “if and when you decide you want to be a Mom, I think you'd make a pretty great one.”

 

“Yeah well, I did learn from someone pretty great, that's for sure.”

 

“You ready?” Maddie asks, and I don't say anything more.  
  
“Don't be a stranger now,” I say as I move past her.  
  
“I'm _so_ jealous you got to meet Patsy Cline,” Maddie squeals, making me chuckle to myself. “Is she nice? Remember that one picture of her and Mom?.....”

 

Julie shuts the passenger side door after me and as I sit thinking of the evening – Rayna, Deacon, Daphne, Hawkins, Cowboy, Dottie, and even Maddie – I know that before any of us were legends, before we found ourselves Walkin' After Midnight or anywhere in between, we were all just starving artists, poets with hearts that happened to bleed melodiously; that a mother's pride at her child's sense of authenticity – even if momentarily lost or stumbled upon imperfectly – is what would truly see one corner of the heavens open up to weep. 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyrics at the end of the chapter are from Patsy Cline's Blue Moon of Kentucky. All credit for those goes to the songwriters.

“Here you go.” Julie sets a steaming mug down in front of me on the dining table, followed by a napkin with a stack of cookies wrapped inside. “I just pulled them from the oven a little while ago. They've been cooling on a rack on the counter, but they're probably still fairly warm.”

 

“Thanks,” I smile gratefully. “Where's your Mom?”

 

“Down in her music room doing something or other.”

 

“This early?” I ask, raising my eyebrow. It's not quite ten in the morning.

 

“She never stops,” Julie laughs. “I'll get her.” She saunters over to the door of her mother's basement and pulls it open, allowing noise to waft upwards. It doesn't do this otherwise. The walls of the entire house are thick, the space itself all but soundproof. “Mama!” she calls down the stairs, “Daphne's here!”

 

“Gavin,” I warn my eighteen month old son as he steps too close for comfort to where Julie is situated. “Come back over here, Mommy's got something for you.”

 

“Mama?” He turns and looks at me quizzically.

 

“Yeah, you know I'm talking to you, don't cha? Come over here. Mommy's got cookies.”

 

“I wannsa tookie!!” Gavin answers gleefully, clapping his hands.

 

“I know you do,” I laugh. “Come here and you can have it. Julie made 'em, they're really yummy. You better run fast though or I'm gonna eat 'em all.”

 

“Nooooo, I wannsa tookie!” he shrieks, running toward me.

 

“What do you say?” I ask him as I scoop him up into my lap, eyes twinkling, trying and failing miserably to hold back my laughter.

 

“Pease?” he asks me. “Tookie?”

 

“Good job,” I praise once he uses his manners, breaking a soft, chewy biscuit in half and making sure it's not scalding in the middle. “Here. Be careful. They're sticky.”

 

“Mmm, tookie,” he mumbles happily.

 

“He's so big,” Julie says sadly as she backs away from the basement stairs and I hear her mother's boots thumping against the wood as she ascends them. “I remember when you told me you'd decided to go through with your pregnancy and keep 'em. Says a lot of words. Mine weren't talking that much at that age.”

 

“Oh yeah,” I chuckle. “Gets that from me. I don't shut up, as we all know. He's pretty smart.”

 

“Passy!” Gavin yells excitedly when she stops at the top of the stairs. “I hassa tookie!”

 

“I see that,” Patsy laughs as she watches him wave what's left of his treat in the air. “Did you get any in your mouth? Your hands look awful dirty.”

 

His big eyes dart between me and Patsy repeatedly before he brings a chubby hand up to his mouth and runs his tongue slowly across the palm.

 

“Eewww, Gav!” I shriek, laughing.

 

“Here,” Julie tosses me a damp cloth from her spot near the kitchen sink and I make quick work of wiping down my child.

 

“What a ham,” Patsy says, shaking her head.  
  
“He's definitely my kid,” I nod, returning him gently to the floor.

 

“You're awful blonde, ain't ya?” she says looking down at him once he's run around the opposite side of the table and stopped in front of her, hugging her calves. “I don't think you've got any of Daddy in you.”

 

“Thankfully,” I mutter as Patsy scoops him up onto her hip. I always worry she might break something, but usually she has more energy than all of us put together. I often forget she is not invincible, immortal. I hope that it's a long time before we have to say goodbye to each other, though she herself brings up such things in conversation and tries to prepare us often.

 

“Have you heard from him at all?” she questions me, referring to my child's father as she walks toward the sink where Julie stands, washing dishes.

 

“He was at the house around six this morning and woke me and Maddie and Darren up out of a dead sleep banging on the door and carrying on,” I say flatly, “but that's the first time since before Gavin was born.”

 

“What the hell?” Julie cranes her neck toward me, looking surprised. “You didn't tell me that. Does Deacon know?”

 

“I'd guess not,” Patsy interjects. “I didn't hear any shotguns goin' off.”

 

“You'll hear 'em all across Nashville if he finds out, I'd imagine.” I'm only half joking.

 

“Tooooookies,” Gavin says longingly, trying to reach for the one Patsy plucked off the cooling rack.

 

“No,” she says sternly, holding it away out of his reach. “You don't need anymore. You won't eat supper later then Mommy'll be mad at ol' Patsy for givin' 'em to ya.”

 

“Auntie Julie shouldn't have made so many,” Julie says of herself, laughing. “Whoopsie.”

 

“Ju-ju!” Gavin singsongs, and I snort.

 

“Ju-lee,” she sings back to him, leaning in toward her mother to peck him on the nose. “Say it.”

 

“Ju-ghee,” the baby parrots back to her, all smiles, proud of himself.

 

“Close enough,” Patsy tells him. “What's my name?” she asks, pointing to herself. Gavin points too, and she nods. “You know me. Say Pat-see.”

 

“Passy!” He yells.  
  
“ _Pat_ sy,” I enunciate from across the room before it falls silent.

 

“Nooooo,” Gavin answers, shaking his head. “ _Nuh-_ uh.”

 

 

“He'll get it,” Patsy tells me, chuckling. “My arms are fallin' asleep, child. I'm gonna put you down. Go play with your trucks in the livin' room.”

 

“Vrooooom!” he says happily, running away from us.  
  
Finished with the dishes, Julie dries her hands on a dish towel and steps back over toward the table, pulling up a chair next to her mother. “I want that kid,” she tells me. “Such a cutie.”

 

“I'll have to loan him to you for a while,” I offer. “He's not that sweet all the time.”

 

“Ha, I remember those days,” Patsy muses. “I hated being away from y'all so much though. Was always happy to get home no matter what kind of moods I'd find you and Randy in.”

 

“I know,” Julie nods. “Dad used to hype us up so much when he wasn't with you and you'd be coming home. It was like Christmas Day was coming around again.”

 

“Are you sure y'all are okay with watching Gavin last minute while I'm working my other job?” I question timidly, not for the first time since I'd set foot in Patsy's house. I'd picked up a couple other jobs for those days I found I wasn't scheduled to work or play The Bluebird. You didn't have off days as a mother, and I couldn't really afford them. Patsy and Julie had been incredibly understanding and kind to me since we'd bumped into each other, but somehow I always feared they'd come to see me as an imposition.

 

“Maddie is busy, but I could totally ask Dad. You can say no, I swear.”

 

“Child, please,” Patsy drawls at me, waving a hand through the air dismissively. “You know as well as I do none of us could say no to that baby. It's no trouble. Not like we have much else to do. I sure as hell don't, anyway.”

 

“Thank you,” I say emphatically. “So much. Y'all are saving me so much money not having to enroll him in daycare full time.”

 

“You're welcome,” Julie says, smiling. “So what was it that Josh wanted this morning?”

 

“ _Oh_ yeah!” I breathe, hitting myself on the forehead with the heel of one hand. I'd forgotten I'd even brought it up. “Duh.”

 

***~***

 

_“Who the fuck keeps screaming and banging on my door like that?!” Maddie yells. The anger in her tone and her even louder stomping have jolted me out of a dead sleep, caused me to panic and look over at the crib across from me, praying Gavin is still sleeping._

_“Babe, you need to calm down,” I hear my brother in law tell her softly. “You're gonna wake everybody else up.”_

_“Oh, and this clown won't?!” Maddie huffs at Darren._  
  
_“He might,” Darren says loudly over a fresh round of pounding on their front door. “But you're not helping.”_

_“For fuck's sake, what do you want?!” Maddie yells as she hauls the door open and the hinges protest. For a fraction of a second everything is silent. The name that falls off her lips on the other side of that silence causes my stomach to lurch and drop to my feet. I cannot see her, but I don't doubt that her eyes are both flashing with fire and cold as ice. “Josh.”_

_“Maddie,” he says flatly. “Is your sister here?”_

_“How did you find my house?” she asks him, sidestepping his original question, “and why would Daphne be here?”_

_“It wasn't hard,” Josh tells her. “Google is a thing, you know.”_

_“I officially hate the internet,” Maddie groans, and I chuckle._  
  
_“No you don't,” Darren scoffs, laughing. “You can hardly put your phone down.”_

_Swinging my legs over the side of the mattress, I take in the neon numbers of my alarm clock, realising it's only just about six thirty. It's not set to go off for at least another hour. Sighing, I decide to get up anyway. Josh never was one to give up easily, and I don't want him invading my space and waking up Gavin._

_I gently tug the door of the spare room open and tiptoe out, turning on the hallway lights, dimming them to the lowest setting that still allows me to see in the dark._

_“You look like hell,” I tell Josh once I'm face to face with him. I'm not speaking loudly, but he still startles. His hair is longer than it was the last time I saw him, and the ends are split. He does not appear to be high, but his skin is pale and sickly and his clothes look ratty and worn._

_“Well hello to you too,” he retorts. “We're as blunt and feisty as ever, I see.”_

_“Fuck you,” I say, rolling my eyes. “Are you even aware of what time it is?”_

_“Yeah,” he answers slowly, as though I'm stupid for having asked. “I have to work early. I wanted to see you.”_

_“Oh, so you show up to my sister's house, where you're not even a hundred percent sure I'm staying, and just start screaming and banging on her door like an idiot? Are you high?”_

_“No I'm not high!” he says defensively._

_I believe him. I've seen him when he was higher than anybody else in the room, but I'm still unimpressed by his behaviour. “Normal people don't act like that, Josh,” I tell him flatly. “Why didn't you call? Better yet, come around when people might be awake?”_

_“Like you would have answered my calls if I had?” he says, and I fall silent. He's not wrong. I haven't had much desire to see him since before Gavin was born. Neither of us have tried very hard, but I have never fully trusted his intentions unless I too was under the influence. It is imperative that I protect our child at all costs, even if that means protection from his own flesh and blood._

_“I deserve that,” I say. “How'd you even know where I was?”_

_“People talk,” he says evasively. “I've heard some stuff since I got clean and started paying attention. I figured you'd either be here or at Patsy's house.”_

_My face must be showing the confusion I'm trying to mask, because Josh quickly resumes talking._

_“I know y'all have played The Bluebird together a few times,” he says sheepishly._

_“You were there?” I ask, surprised._

_“Nah.” He shakes his head, looks me in the eyes. “I was either too fucked up at the time, in the throes of detox, or too nervous to actually show up, but I know people who went. They said you put on a real good show. Couple of 'em said they had heard you and Patsy had been hanging around each other a little bit.”_

_“Does anybody ever keep their mouths shut around here?” I say, and he laughs._

_“I doubt it.”_

_Maddie has not interjected her two cents into our conversation the entire time we've been standing awkwardly in the hallway, and as my eyes dart around the space quickly, I don't see her or Darren behind Josh anymore. I decide that the two must have taken their cue to head back up the stairs, and I'm grateful._

_“Can I see him?” Josh speaks up timidly, piercing the silence I wish I hadn't let fall between us. “Gavin?”_

_My defenses rise and the worst kind of butterflies fill my stomach. I don't want to show my apprehension, and I know my voice will betray me if I speak too much, so I go with the simplest answer I can think of, comforted by the fact I've not even had to fabricate it._

_“He's sleeping,” I whisper, looking down at the floorboards._

_“Oh.” I watch his feet shuffle as he shifts weight awkwardly from one worn Converse sneaker to the other, unsure what to do with himself. “Can I peek?” His eyes are pleading, as though he's trying to say he's sorry without saying it at all. “I won't wake him, I promise.”_

_“Alright,” I agree reluctantly, sighing, resigned. “But be very quiet.”_

_I hadn't shut the door all the way when I'd walked through it earlier, and a light push sees it open back up enough that we can enter soundlessly. I giggle when I notice that Gavin is not, in fact, still sound asleep. He has pulled himself up into a sitting position, and is babbling happily to his toy giraffe I long ago named Bub. He never sleeps without it. I have duplicates on hand so that none of us around him have to find out the kind of hellish evening we might experience should he find that he has to._

_“Hi baby,” I say softly, crouching down to his level and smiling. “You're awake.”_  
  
_“Mama!” he singsongs, pointing at me._

_“Yeah,” I coo. “Good morning.” I reach into the crib and gently pull him up, situating him comfortably on my hip before moving to stand directly in front of his father._

_“This is Mommy's friend Josh,” I tell him, pointing. I can see in Josh's eyes that he is hurt, but I'm not ready to explain to Gavin who he really is. I cannot bear to see him disappointed and confused should his father prove to be selling false hope and choose again, for another perhaps even longer and more affecting period, not to be in his son's life. “Can you say hi?”_

_“Yosh!” Gavin says proudly, waving._

_“Hey buddy.” Josh laughs, ruffling his hair. “He looks like you.”_

_“That's what everyone keeps saying,” I smile, moving to sit on my bed and placing Gavin gently down next to me. I give him the hard plastic children's book I'd read repeatedly before he'd fallen asleep last night and left on my night stand, too tired to rise and place it back on the bookcase. He studies each picture, flipping the pages back and forth happily._

_“You've detoxed again?” I ask Josh as he moves closer, remembering what he'd said in passing about it earlier._

_“Yeah,” he nods. “Can I sit?” He gestures toward the empty space on the opposite side of the mattress to Gavin and I, and I nod. “I did once before too,” he tells me as he situates himself. “But I relapsed. Sister said she'd kick me out if I mess up again.”_

_“You're staying with Jenna?” I ask him, surprised. Last I knew, the two of them hated each other._

_“Nope, Candi,” he answers, referring to his eldest sister, Candace._  
  
_“Ah,” I say. “How's it feel? Sobriety, I mean?”_

_“Bad,” he says without hesitating. “I mean good, but bad. Took a while to stop puking my guts up this time. Detox sucks.”_

_A wave of sympathy engulfs me. I know I had nowhere near as hard a time coming off things as him. I was lucky not to have found myself worse off. “I'm sorry,” I say quietly, and I mean it. “How long's it been?”_

_“Not quite a month yet,” he says. “I still think about it, but I know it's not worth it.”_  
  
_“Good for you,” I tell him, so softly I question whether he heard._

_“Thanks.” He folds his long legs up under him, sitting cross legged. “I've missed you,” he admits, looking directly into my face._  
  
_“Josh,” I warn. “Don't.”_

_“I mean it, Daphne. I've thought about you so often. Gavin too. I was struggling. I didn't know how to reach out. Wasn't sure if you'd even want me to.”_

_“Sometimes I think it would've been nice,” I admit. “Other times I probably would've knocked you in the teeth.”_

_“That's fair,” he says, picking at a loose thread on my comforter. “I wasn't very good to you.”_

_“No,” I concur, “you weren't. But nobody held a gun to my head and forced me to stick around either.”_

_“I loved you, you know.”_

_“You didn't even know me, Josh,” I say dismissively. “You still don't. We hung around each other getting fucked up and then got naked and laid down together more than we should've.”_

_I know my words are cruel, but I can't stop them from rolling off my tongue, sliding from my mouth. I can't hold them in my hand and feel the sharpness of their uneven edges, like shards of broken glass. I cannot take them back._  
  
_“You don't mean that,” he says, and I'm sure I detect a tremor in his voice._

_The fact words are a lie does not change how deeply they can cut, but I can tell Josh knows of the falseness in mine just as well as I do._

_The stars told us stories of faraway galaxies that even copious amounts of toxic, mind altering substances couldn't take us to. Their brightness burned into my retinas as we lay under them, the chill in the air they clung to searing my lungs as I told him of my mother. All of the smallest details I'd assumed forgotten spilled from me with the force of an overflowing dam, and I spoke of her whilst laughing rather than crying. I rehashed every fight my sister and I had ever had, relived every treacherous storm that had ever raged and coursed through my blood over the errors of our fathers and the very fact we didn't share the same one._

_Inch by inch I had allowed him to expose my flesh, given unspoken consent to a body's exploration. He had held firmly to self defiled wrists, his lips a salve against branding that would never wholly disappear, and when he settled himself between my thighs, I found myself wishing that virginity could be relinquished more than once; overcome by the feeling I'd entrusted it to the wrong person. I was almost certain the earth was slowly imploding beneath us and that soon I'd come face to face with God._

_“Not entirely.” I shatter the silence, my voice hoarse, limbs tingling as an after effect of the memory. “But I definitely don't know that what we had was love._  
  
_“Have you loved anyone while sober?” I realise he has never talked to me about this if he has._

_“I don't think so,” he tells me thoughtfully, having pondered it for a moment. “But I'd like to._

_“I gotta go get ready for work,” he says as an afterthought. He rises, standing in front of me awkwardly. “What are you doing later?”_

_I don't know whether he is asking because he wants to see me again or because he wants to spend more time with Gavin, but I convince myself it's the latter._

_“I'm gonna swing by Patsy's and see if she or Julie can watch Gav while I'm at work. Maddie and Darren are busy and I really don't want to ask Deacon if I don't have to.”_

_I remember the months after I had told him I was pregnant. How he had tiptoed around me, speaking in short, choppy sentences, only if and when I spoke to him first. We were talking again, but the elephant still loomed large and overbearing in every room. We didn't share a bloodline, but a father's disappointment seemed to permanently etch itself into every feature on his face. I didn't know if those changes to his skin brought on by worry and stress would ever go away, if he'd ever look at me the same way again._

_“And then?” Josh prods._

_“Then I'll probably have dinner over there before I bring him home,” I say as I rise from my own spot on the bed, scooping Gavin up with me. “Assuming they'll watch him.”_

_“Oh.”_

_“D'you wanna come?” The question is out of my mouth before I can stop it, but I need something to say that will ease the awkwardness and see us part ways amicably. I hope sincerely that Patsy doesn't want to kill me._

_“Yeah, okay,” Josh agrees with a half smile. “I'll be there. Text me when.”_

_“Send me your number and I will,” I tell him, unsure whether he still even has the same one._

_He nods. “Hey, Daph?” he calls as I walk back out into the hallway, turn toward the bathroom so I can get Gavin washed and ready for the day._

_“Hmmm?” I answer, turning on my heel and popping my head back around the door jamb._

_“Sorry I was such an ass this morning.”_

_“S'alright.” I wave him off, secretly appreciative of the apology. “Don't let it happen again.”_

**~*~**

 

 

“You invited him for dinner?” Julie asks incredulously once I've finished my recounting of the morning.

 

“What was I supposed to do?” I say defensively. “Tell him my plans and leave? I could tell he didn't want to leave Gavin. Maddie and I got into a huge thing about it after he left. I really don't need a lecture from you, too.”

 

“Leave her alone,” Patsy chides, looking at Julie. “It's just dinner.”

 

“So you're not mad?” I ask tentatively.

 

“You'd know if I was, honeychild.” She half smiles. “No, I'm not mad. I'll make enough food. Josh can come. On one condition.”

 

“What's that?” I question. I don't know whether I want to hear the answer.

 

“I'm inviting Deacon too.”

 

“Patsy, no,” I beg. “Please don't.”

 

“He has a right to know,” she says. “No Deacon, no Josh.”

 

“Fine,” I grumble. “But you'll have to deal with the fallout. I can't see this going well.”

 

“He likes me,” she winks. “It'll be alright.”

 

“What'd Maddie say?” Julie wants to know.

 

“That she doesn't trust him and I'm stupid.”

 

Her eyes widen. “She said _that?_ ”

 

“Not in so many words.” I spin the Lazy Susan mindlessly around the middle of the tabletop. “But yeah.”

 

“I'm sorry,” she apologizes.

 

“It is what it is,” I shrug. “I gotta get out of her house.”

 

“Why?” Patsy asks me.

 

“We're under each others' feet too often. We lead different lives. She's married with a fast paced career and I'm the fuck up sister, struggling singer/songwriter hopping from job to job with a baby on my hip.”

 

“Oh honey,” Patsy stops my hand moving the wooden fixture in the middle of the table. “You can't look at it like that.”

 

“Why not?” I say bitterly. “That's exactly how it is. I love my sister, but she can be such an uppity bitch.”

 

“Daphne!” Julie scolds me.

 

“No, Julie, you don't know her like I do.” I feel my eyes filling with tears and fight the urge to let them fall. “It's like she's never done anything wrong in her whole fucking life.”

 

I wipe a lone tear with the back of my sleeve, see Julie's mouth open and close out of the corner of my eye like she wants to say something more, have the last word, but her mother shakes her head no, sending warning with her eyes.

 

“Honey, you better get goin',” Patsy tells me, looking at the clock. “You're gonna be late for work. It's already 11:30.”

 

“Shit,” I mutter, hastily standing up from my chair and grabbing my coat off the back of it. “Gav!” I call in the direction of the living room, “Mama's leavin'!”

 

“Bye Mom-eeeeee!” he singsongs, and I can hear him start to run toward me. His sock feet slip and slide on the kitchen tile once he crosses the threshold.

 

“Careful,” Julie tells him, and he slows.

 

“Come give me a hug, baby.” Crouching down to his level, I open my arms. “I'll be back for dinner.”

 

“Bye bye,” he mumbles into my shoulder as I squeeze him. “Luh you!”

 

“Listen to that twang,” Patsy laughs.

 

“Where'd that come from?” Julie says as I stand up, extending a travel mug filled with coffee mixed to my tastes.

 

“I wonder,” I answer sarcastically, glancing between them as they explode in fits of raucous laughter.

 

 

**~*~**

 

 

“This must be what the precursor to death feels like,” I groan as I make my way through Patsy's front door and shrug off my coat.

 

“Daphne what's wrong?” Julie stills the motion of the chef's knife she's using to chop vegetables at the butcher's block and looks at me apprehensively. “What are you doing home so early?”

 

“I feel like I'm dying,” I tell her, my nasal passages full of congestion. “Client sent me home once I started cleaning her house and stopped to throw up. Had to clean the toilet about three times before I left.”

 

“Oh no,” she coos, clicking her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Sit down, let me make you some chicken broth or something.”

 

“Okay,” I mumble as I step slowly toward the living room, too exhausted to protest.

 

“Not in there,” Julie says anxiously when I'm already in the doorway. “Shit.”

 

“Josh,” I gasp, taken aback.

 

“Hey,” he answers quietly, looking up at me. Patsy is on the floor opposite him, legs tucked up under her while she races matchbox cars with Gavin along the mat I got him for his birthday, soft and coloured in like a racetrack.

 

“What're you doing here?” I ask him. “Dinner's not til later.”

 

“Boss let me off early,” he says, shrugging. “It was slow. I didn't know what else to do. I figured I'd be here later anyway, and you said you were hopefully dropping Gavin off.”

 

“You look awful,” Patsy tells me when she finally looks behind her.

 

“I feel even worse,” I admit, momentarily overcome by a sensitivity to the bright room and screwing my eyes shut. “I was sick at work. My bones ache.”

 

“Can I do anything?” Josh asks kindly. “Run you a bath or something?”

 

“That sounds amazing,” I nod, abandoning my pride. “Thank you.”

 

“No problem,” he smiles, leaving Patsy and Gavin to their own devices and standing up. “How d'you like your water?”

 

“Hot,” I say simply. “Blisteringly.”

 

He nods silently, eyes darting aimlessly trying to figure out which bathroom he should use.

 

“That way,” I laugh, pointing in the direction of the master.

 

“Right,” he says. “I'll be back.”

 

“He seems like he's trying,” Patsy says quietly once Josh is out of hearing range and I've plopped down on the reclining sofa beneath a wool blanket. “Was really good with Gavin all day.”

 

“Was he?” I ask. “He seemed pretty into him this morning, the short time he was at Maddie's.”

 

“You're not upset he showed up early?” Her eyebrow raises.  
  
“I'd only be upset if y'all had left the two of them alone.” I stifle a yawn with the palm of my hand. “I don't trust his intentions or his sobriety enough for that right now.”

 

“Honey, I would never,” she says, horrified.

 

**~*~**

 

“Do you want bubbles or a bath bomb in it?” Josh asks me sitting on the side of the tub, water still pelting down inside. I can see the steam rolling upward as I shake the elastic loose from my hair and let the strands cascade down my back.

 

“Bubbles, please,” I say decisively. “The lavender scented ones.”

 

He carefully reads the labels on each of the many bottles situated across from him, pouring the thick, purple liquid slowly downward when he finds the right one. When he makes waves in the water with his hand so as to see it foam, I realise – maybe for the first time – that his fingers are even longer and more delicate looking than mine.

 

“Ready,” he smiles, turning off the tap.

 

There's a light knock on the door, and we both glance toward it. “Your broth is ready,” Julie calls. “I put it in a Thermos so you can drink it in the tub if you want.”

 

“I'll get it,” Josh offers, stepping past me and opening the door. Taking the container from Julie, he thanks her and sets it on the corner of the vanity.

 

“Y'all better not be makin' anymore babies in there,” Patsy yells. “If I hear anything I'll have to get my cane and beat the door down.”

 

“OH MY GOD,” Julie shrieks, half disgusted, half amused. “What the hell Mom?”

 

Josh is shaking so violently that his laughter is silent.

 

“You don't need a cane,” Julie adds as an afterthought.  
  
“Well I know that, child, but the boy don't!”

 

“Leave me alone,” I say in mock annoyance. “I'm sick!”

 

I can hear Julie laughing and mumbling to herself all the way down the hall.

 

**~*~  
  
  
**

“Need a hand?” Josh juts his chin outward and toward me in the direction of my breasts. I have abandoned my sweater in a heap on the floor, and fighting against the soreness that has settled in the depths of my bones, I'm struggling to unhook the clasp on my bra.

 

“I got it,” I say hesitantly, unconvincing, even to myself. “I think.”

 

“Daphne,” he says gently, watching my cheeks flush as I become increasingly frustrated. “Let me help you. It's not like you have anything I haven't seen before.”

 

“I know,” I sigh. “But it's not how you remember it.”

 

“What's not?” He looks quizzically at me.

 

 _“Everything,”_ I wail, “I'm fat.”

 

“You are _not_ fat,” he says forcefully. “Not at all.”

 

Rising from the tub ledge, he moves around behind me, carefully sliding my hair to one side with his fingers. I can feel the heat of his shallow breaths on the nape of my neck, and the fine hairs that rest there stand at attention.

 

The clasps loosen easily under his expert fingertips, within seconds of each other. He doesn't have to fidget. I feel the straps slide down my shoulders and my breasts fall forward as I slide my arms out of them, balling up the garment and tossing it to the floor atop my sweater.

 

“That's cute,” he says of the tattoo in honour of our son across my shoulder as I slip out of my pants. He's remained behind me, whether out of respect or because he doesn't trust himself not to, I'm unsure. “When did you get that?”

 

I can feel his fingers' light tracing of the lettering.

 

_Gavin Gareth Conrad_

 

His birth date and newborn footprint rest beneath it.  
  
“About nine months back,” I say, stepping carefully over the tub's edge and into the scalding water. All sense of unease abandons me once I am afforded almost total modesty beneath the excess of bubbles.

 

“Chicken broth?” He offers me the Thermos, remembering it once he moves to sit atop the lid of the toilet.

 

“Thanks,” I say as he reaches out to me and I take it, sipping slowly. “What'd you and Gavin do today?” It is asked more out of a need to fill the silence and distract myself from my illness than anything. I rest my eyes, bothered by the light's assault of them.

 

“Read some books,” Josh answers. I can hear the smile in his voice without even having to look at him. “Watched some football, coloured some pictures, ate some food. That kid eats a lot, man.”

 

“You're tellin' me,” I laugh. “He's a tank.”

 

“Look at this,” he says, and I open my eyes to find him pulling his phone from his pocket, sifting through pictures. He turns the screen toward me once he's found what he was searching for: Gavin in his high chair next to Patsy's kitchen table, the stain of blackberries everywhere but on his lips. “He ate one of those little containers of them all to himself.”

 

“Yeah,” I laugh. “Usually gets more on him than he does in him.”

 

“Hey, I'm twenty eight and I still do that,” he tells me, and I laugh loudly.

 

“Are you cold?” He asks me when the silence falls between us afresh and is drawn out too long. “You're shaking.”

 

I nod, knowing I must have a fever.

 

“Here.” Josh glances around the space quickly, his eyes landing on a deep container previously filled with coconut oil or one of Patsy's skin creams that she now used for a storage container. Flipping it over, he lets all the knick knacks inside spill out before filling it to the brim with fresh, steaming water from the tap and pouring it slowly over my shoulders. “Too hot?”

 

“Perfect,” I murmur. “Please continue.”

 

“Deacon's here!” Julie calls against the door. “Just to let you know.”

 

 

“Fuck,” I say under my breath. “I really don't wanna do this.”

 

“You don't have to,” Josh assures me. “I'll meet him alone if you really don't feel well. You can sleep if you want. It's no big deal.”

 

“No,” I say emphatically, unwilling to even entertain the idea. “I'm not asking you to do that.”

 

“You're right,” he insists. “I'm offering.”

 

“No,” I repeat. “No, no, and no.”

 

“If you're sure.”

 

“I'll be alright,” I insist. “Just... don't touch me.”

 

“Sorry,” he mumbles, backing away from my shoulders, replacing the container he'd used on the counter.

 

“No,” I chuckle, feeling badly for his confusion. “I mean in front of Dad,” I clarify. “Don't touch me unless you wanna get shot.”

 

“Jesus,” Josh chortles. “Is he that bad?”

 

“He can be,” I answer seriously. “When he wants to.”

 

 

**~*~**

 

“You know, Josh,” Deacon sputters through a mouthful of spaghetti. “You ain't half bad. But like I said, you mess with my baby again and I'll kill ya.”

 

“Alright, Dad, we know,” Maddie admonishes him. “That's enough.” I'm entirely surprised at her defense of my baby's father, given the spat we'd gotten into earlier in the morning, but I'm grateful. I hadn't even expected her to be there.  
  
“Daphne, honey, are you sure you don't want anything?” Julie offers again. “There's a ton left.”

 

I shake my head. “I'll take some home with me,” I promise. “But I don't want to get sick again.”

 

“Why don't you go lay down in one of the spare rooms?” she urges me. “Gavin just went down again, you don't have to sit and watch us eat if you don't want to.”

 

“That sounds like a good idea,” Josh nods, squeezing my hand under the table. “Go.”

 

“Yeah, you go on and get some sleep,” Patsy echoes, “but hold on a minute. I gotta talk to you about somethin' first.”

 

“What's wrong?” I say, slowly looking around the table and taking everyone's faces. “What's going on?”

 

“Hell if I know,” Julie says, and the rest of them seem just as clueless to Patsy's shenanigans.

 

“Here,” she says, the palm of her hand disguising something. It sounds metallic as it slides across the table, stopping almost directly in front of me.

 

“A key,” I state, confused, turning it over in my hand repeatedly. “To what?”

 

“A house,” Patsy answers, as though she's just announced she's bought me McDonald's.

 

“You bought me a house?” My eyes widen in disbelief. “Please tell me you didn't.”

 

“Child, I didn't buy it,” she drawls. “Not recently. I already own it.”

 

“You own it,” I say skeptically, more confused than before.

 

“It belongs to the guest house.” She is silent, letting me connect the dots. “You've been sayin' you need to spread your wings a little bit, so I figured you can have it. It's big enough for you and the baby. Your baby's babies, too, if you wanted.”

 

“Oh, God, Pat, no.. I can't...” My mouth opens and closes involuntarily. I am at a total loss.

 

“Yes you can,” she retorts. “Nobody's using it. No point lettin' it sit empty.”

 

“But I'm not your family,” I counter. “What if Julie and Randy want it when you die?”

 

“Who says I'm dyin'?” she smirks, eyes twinkling. “Me and God talk an awful lot and he ain't ready for me yet.  
  
  
“And who says you ain't family?! That word's got a lot of meanings, child.”

 

“Don't worry about me and Randy,” Julie chimes in. “We're set no matter what happens.”

 

“Thank you,” I choke out, sobbing, unable to think of anything else that would be even close to appropriate. “You really didn't have to.”

 

“It's fully furnished,” Patsy says. “Minus the bed. I use that in my bedroom, but you can put yours in there.”

 

“Are you fucking kidding me?” I ask rhetorically, knowing she's deadly serious. “At least let me come up with a rent-to-own plan or something,” I say. “Please.”

 

“We can talk about it when you feel better,” she promises, not wholly dismissing the idea, and I instantly feel better. “You can go do a walk through if you feel up to it.”

 

“Can I go?” Josh asks her, and she looks at him as though the question is unnecessary.

 

“Of course you can,” Patsy tells him, and he stands, taking my arm so we can walk together to the opposite side of the property.

 

 

**~*~**

 

“Babe, look at these taps!” Josh calls to me excitedly as I step into the spacious guest house kitchen. “Motion sensors.” He waves his hand beneath the faucet and water cascades downward into the sink without him having to actually touch it.

 

“ _Fan_ cy,” I intone, whistling, though they're not even close to the most luxurious thing my eyes have taken in so far. “Did you just call me babe?” I question, thinking I must have misheard.

 

“Sorry,” Josh mumbles, embarrassed. “Old habits die hard.”

 

“You don't have to apologize,” I tell him, stepping closer. “I'm just not used to hearing it, that's all.”

 

“I know,” he says. He embraces me tightly once I'm close enough to allow it. He is both familiar and unfamiliar, home and entirely new territory. I have known him to be both good and bad, a force that has made me feel both safe and unsafe. Perhaps, I tell myself, all humans are a bit that way. The sentiment does not leave me with any less apprehension.

 

“Listen,” I speak up, an awkward break in our companionable silence. “I don't want to fuck this up again,” I say forcefully, looking up into his face.

 

“I don't want that either,” he assures me. “Why would I?”

 

“We have to move slowly,” I decide. “For Gavin.”

 

“Okay,” he agrees.

 

“And me,” I add as an afterthought.

 

I feel him nodding.

 

“We can't live together.”

 

“Okay,” he says again, not even fighting me on it.

 

“I want you,” I tell him,” and he pulls back, surprised. “But I don't want to watch you kill yourself. I can't.”

 

“Oh,” he breathes, relieved I hadn't meant it in the way he originally thought.

 

“You have to stay clean,” I tell him, “or you'll lose me. The safety of my child will always come first.”

 

“Of course it does,” he says, cupping either side of my face. “I want to do better. I'm trying,” he tells me. “I hope you can see that.”

 

“I saw glimpses today,” I assure him. “I like that person. I could fall in love with that person if you keep proving yourself and give me some time.”

 

“You take all the time you need,” he whispers, bending to kiss the top of my head.

 

“I'm so tired,” I say, overwhelmed by fatigue and a fresh wave of nausea.

 

“Yeah? I'll lay with you if you want.”

 

“There's no bed in here yet,” I remind him.

 

“No, he says, “but the couch looks awful comfy.” Before I can move in that direction, he has scooped me up and carried me to the soft, plush piece of furniture, laying me gently over it.

 

“Don't try anything,” I warn playfully as he sidles up next to me. “And don't kiss me. I don't want to make you sick,” I say. “Plus, kissing leads to stuff.”

 

“Scouts honour,” he swears. “But I can hold you, right?” he smiles, and I realise again how cold I am.

 

“I'd like that,” I tell him, resting my head against his shoulder.

 

**~*~**

 

 _I said blue moon of Kentucky, keep on a-shining,_  
_shine on the one that's gone and left me blue_  
_Blue moon of Kentucky, keep on a-shining,_  
_shine on the one that's gone and left me blue_

 _It was on one moonlit night, stars shining bright,_  
_whispered on high, love said goodbye_

 _I said blue moon of Kentucky, keep on a-shining,_  
_shine on the one that's gone and left me blue_

 _Blue moon of Kentucky, keep on a-shining,_  
_shine on the one that's gone and left me blue_  
_Blue moon of Kentucky, keep on a-shining,_  
_shine on the one that's gone and left me blue_

 _Well, it was on one moonlit night, stars shining bright,_  
_whispered on high, your love said goodbye_  
_I said blue moon of Kentucky, keep on a-shining,_  
_shine on the one that's gone and left me blue_

 _Left me blue,_  
_Left me blue,_  
_Left me blue...._

 

 

“Josh!”

 

I hear my name being called sharply, as though whoever has uttered it is annoyed they've been unable to catch and hold my attention, but there is only one person in the room that has it.

 

Tootsie's is packed, and every set of eyes is fixated on Daphne.

 

For most of the evening, mine would have been among them, but I cannot seem to avert my gaze from the glint of the rock on her finger.

 

It is a promise to her, to myself, that I will never be the cause of her singing songs like this one again.

 

It is the declaration, both apparent and inconspicuous, that I want to gift her my last name.

 

It is my vow to her that I will be a better man.

 

Her eagerness to wear it and continued trust in its symbolism has already made me one.

 

“Josh!”

 

“Sorry,” I mutter, finally turning in my seat. “What?”

 

“When's the wedding?” Someone whose face I can't quite place asks me.

 

“Not soon enough,” I answer. “Not soon enough.”  

 


End file.
